Report: Apple TV to stream 99 cent TV show rentals

Apple is reportedly in talks with TV studios to sell them on the idea of renting TV episodes for 99 cents rather than selling downloads for $1.99.

According to a report by NewTeeVee, the rental program Apple is promoting would work just like existing movie rentals: users would have 30 days to start watching the show, and would then need to finish within 24 hours of starting playback.

Unlike movie rentals and other iTunes sales however, the TV programming would be streamed from Apple's cloud servers. Such a service would seemingly be ideal for the rumored iOS-based replacement to today's Apple TV, which is expected to lack a conventional hard drive and instead reply upon on-demand cloud streaming and local wireless sharing.

The recently unveiled Hulu Plus is similarly seeking to determine what customers will pay to access TV shows. It now charges $9.99 per month for access to shows on ABC, Fox and NBC.

Apple has previously dragged hesitant TV and movie studios to the iTunes market and forced them to drink, typically starting with its closest ally, Disney, and slowly winning over other companies, selling them on the merits of direct downloads and rentals.

I respectfully disagree. Sometimes, I miss a TV show because I failed to record it, or maybe I saw a new show mid-season and decided I'd like to view the rest. Renting for $0.99 is like buying music for $0.99. It's cheap enough to be an impulse buy. And even though you don't actually OWN the TV episode, I think the economics favor that route. I don't have to pay double or more to buy just one episode, which sucks up storage space. I'm not forced to pay full price for a whole season. If it streams over the web, then I can presumably watch it anywhere I go.

In truth, I don't care to own my TV episodes (or movies for that matter) in digital form the way I wanted my music in digital form simply because with video, visual compression artifacts are far more noticeable than in audible music. And video is much larger in terms of file size than audio as well. So if I can pay rock-bottom price just to rent one to watch it and no intention or need to own it, I like this idea.

How's this for a report: None of these reports are anything close to what Apple is actually going to do with TV!

All these Apple TV rumours are so far off the mark its amazing that people pay attention to them.

Don't you get it? Apple doesn't want sell a box that you hook up to a TV. Apple wants to sell a TV. An actual TV. Which just happens to be loaded with Apple services and software.

The next Apple TV is a TV.

My two cents.

Too expensive I think. They would have to make multiple sets (screen sizes) to satisfy various needs. I don't think they are prepared to do that. They already have the technology to make a box that ANYONE can use.